About Annibale Carracci

Annibale Carracci is credited with putting Bolognese art on the map and encouraging a shift away from late 16th-century mannerist painting. He looked to Northern Italian Renaissance painters such as Titian and Antonio da Correggio for inspiration. Carracci was more interested in the art of the craft than making a name for himself as a court painter, and his work is marked by broken brushwork that captures the effects of light on form. His landscapes, which display a compositional balance between human figures, buildings, and nature, were considered boldly innovative at the time of their creation. Carracci is best known for painting the ceiling frescos at the Farnese Palace in Rome in 1604. Quoting from Michelangelo and emulating the compositional style of Raphael, Carraci painted the ceiling as an opening into the sky and studded it with trompe l’oeil easel paintings of mythological scenes.